I’m on the governing board of Susie King Taylor Community School, and it’s been amazing to watch the progress the school’s made even since I joined in December. It’s a different model for Savannah, and one that I hope works well enough that it pulls the rest of the school system forward.
If you’re a business in Savannah and want to get involved with the school, teachers are always looking for people to come speak to their class, get involved with a lesson, or let a gaggle of young learners come check out businesses and see how things work. If you’ve got money to spare, we gladly accept donations. If you want to help, but don’t know how, you can reach out and get involved.
What can we do to broaden the enrollment of Susie King to include students whose parents don’t have the foresight or luxury of planning to enroll their students there? I’m a huge fan, and it provides opportunities for low-income students, but even with the incubator, I worry that self-selection prevents even progressive charters like Susie King from drawing in an equitable cross-section of the community.
And then it adds to the brain drain at non-charters…
I’m not saying I don’t think Susie King is an awesome model (I’ve donated to the school); I’m just brainstorming how we can overcome that inherent self-selection that prevents full diversity and equity in enrollment.
I think it comes down to recruiting. The board’s been working on ways to get out into the community to get to parents who might not otherwise hear about the school. It’s not been 100% successful, but we’ve beaten our goal for low-income student enrollment both this year and last year, so I guess it’s doing alright. If you look at our numbers, I think they’re more representative than any of the choice programs.